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Saturday, 7 July 2012

On My Wishlist #93

This is a meme that started on Book Chick City before moving to Cosy
Books and is now hosted by the wonderful Sarah at Workaday Reads. There are so many books out there that I want to read that this is the only way
I can keep track!

I don't read enough science fiction, but I have found some cool books that look at the genre is a different way!

Red Shirts - John Scalzi

Publisher: Tor

Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship "Intrepid," flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It's a prestige posting, and Andrew is thrilled all the more to be assigned to the ship's Xenobiology laboratory. Life couldn't be better...until Andrew begins to pick up on the fact that (1) every Away Mission involves some kind of lethal confrontation with alien forces, (2) the ship's captain, its chief science officer, and the handsome Lieutenant Kerensky always survive these confrontations, and (3) at least one low-ranked crew member is, sadly, always killed.Not surprisingly, a great deal of energy below decks is expendedon avoiding, at all costs, being assigned to an Away Mission. Then Andrew stumbles on information that completely transforms his and his colleagues' understanding of what the starship "Intrepid "really is...and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives...

I grew up watching the repeats of Star Trek on BBC2 and the sound of this story really tickles me! I always wondered if the background crew knew how dangerous it was to go on an away mission with the captain!

Bitter Seeds - Ian Tregillis

Publisher: UK - Orbit

It’s 1939. The Nazis have supermen, the British have demons, and one perfectly normal man gets caught in between. Raybould Marsh is a British secret agent in the early days of the Second World War, haunted by something strange he saw on a mission during the Spanish Civil War: a German woman with wires going into her head who looked at him as if she knew him.When the Nazis start running missions with people who have unnatural abilities—a woman who can turn invisible, a man who can walk through walls, and the woman Marsh saw in Spain who can use her knowledge of the future to twist the present—Marsh is the man who has to face them. He rallies the secret warlocks of Britain to hold the impending invasion at bay. But magic always exacts a price. Eventually, the sacrifice necessary to defeat the enemy will be as terrible as outright loss would be.

This is science fiction as set in 1939 and looks like a really cool look at the second world war. It almost seems like X-Men crossed with magic - I want to read it now!

The Lost Fleet: Dauntless - Jack Campbell

Publisher: Titan Publishing

The Alliance has been fighting the Syndic for a century-and losing badly. Now its fleet is crippled and stranded in enemy territory. Their only hope is Captain John "Black Jack" Geary-a man who's emerged from a century-long hibernation to find he has been heroically idealized beyond belief. Now, he must live up to his own legend...

This is the first in a long series but I like the idea of some action in space mingled with the fish out of water aspect of a man out of his own time.